Little Books, Big Ideas: Ancient Wisdom, Timeless Truths

02/29/2024 / Alexander Atkins / Leave a comment

If you visit a used bookstore, you might stumble upon an often neglected section: miniature or compact books. A miniature book generally measures 3 by 4 inches; some are even smaller: 1.5 inches by 2 inches. A compact book, also known as an octodecimo in American Library Association lingo, generally measures 4 x 6 inches. Unfortunately, these types of books are often dismissed due to their small size. “If they are so small, how can they possibly matter?” you think to yourself. Astute book lovers, however, know that even little books can contain big ideas — profound thoughts that can change your life.

In my periodic visits to used bookstores, I recently came across such a thought-provoking little book: Ancient Wisdom, Timeless Truths: Immortal Philisophers Discuss the Meaning of Life edited by Jude Patterson, published in 2003.

In the introduction of Ancient Wisdom, Timeless Truths, the author writes: “The philosophers and historians of Ancient Greece, Rome, and China shared one common aim: the search for truth… [Their] writings explored the universal themes of life and death, war and peace, the individual and the state, fortune and opportunity, and above all vice and virtue — a code of ethics to guide them in obtaining wisdom and happiness. Then, as now, truth can be found in antiquity — in the wisdom handed down from generation to generation. ” Here are some of the pearls of wisdom from the ancient philosophers:

Socrates: There is only one good, that is knowledge; and there is only one evil, that is ignorance.

Lao-Tzu: The virtuous man promotes agreement; the vicious man allots the blame.

Demosthenes: There is nothing, absolutely nothing, which needs to be more carefully guarded against than that one man should be allowed to become more powerful than the people.”

Chuang-Tzu: Great wisdom is generous, petty wisdom contentious. Greet speech is impassioned, small speech cantankerous.

Marcus Aurelius: Let every action aim solely at the common good.

Plato: Of all the things of a man’s soul which he has within him, justice is the greatest good and injustice the greatest evil.

Aristotle: The best political community is formed by the citizens of the middle class.

Cicero: There is nothing so characteristic of narrowness and littleness of soul as the love of riches.

Socrates: The unexamined life is not worth living.

Aristotle: What is a friend? A single soul dwelling in two bodies.

Virgil: I have known sorrow and learned to aid the wretched.

Aesop: no act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.

Lucretius: If a man would guide his life by true philosophy, he will find ample riches in a modest livelihood enjoyed with a tranquil mind.

Pliny the Younger: A noble spirit will seek the reward of virtue in consciousness of it, rather than in popular opinion.

Plautus: Patience is the best remedy for every trouble.

Confucius: By nature, men are nearly alike; by practice, they get to be wide apart.

Publilius Syrus: It takes a long time to bring excellence to maturity.

Seneca: Men do not care how nobly they live, but only how long, although it is within the reach of every man to live nobly, but within no man’s power to live long.

Ovid: Everything flows onward; all things are brought into being with a changing nature; the ages themselves glide by in constant movement.

ENJOY THE BOOK. If you love reading Atkins Bookshelf, you will love reading the book — Serendipitous Discoveries from the Bookshelf. The beautifully-designed book (416 pages) is a celebration of literature, books, fascinating English words and phrases, inspiring quotations, literary trivia, and valuable life lessons. It’s the perfect gift for book lovers and word lovers.

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Reflections on Love by Rilke on His Birthday

12/04/202312/23/2023 / Alexander Atkins / Leave a comment

alex atkins bookshelf literature December 4 marks the birthday of Austrian poet and writer Rainer Maria Rilke (Dec. 4, 1875 – Dec 29, 1926, born René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke). His name is often mispronounced. The correction pronunciation is “RAY ner” “mr EE uh” “REEL kuh.” Rilke changed his first name from René to Rainer to make it more masculine. His mother, who had lost a baby daughter, compensated by naming Rilke with a girl’s name (Maria) and dressed him in girl’s clothing until the age of fine. Although Rilke’s mother made his childhood miserable, she did encourage him to read and write poetry. At an early age he was reciting Friedrich von Schiller’s poems. Between 1894 and 1922, Rilke wrote over ten volumes of poetry that are highly regarded by literary critics. He was also a prolific letter writer, which leads us to the year 1902, when Rilke was 27 years old.

In 1902 Franz Kappus, a 19-year-old aspiring poet, mailed some poems to Rilke, who was a complete stranger to him, hoping that Rilke would critique his work. Rather than critiquing the young man’s poems, Rilke proceeded to write some of the most famous and cherished letters in literary history. In ten short letters, written during a period of 6 years (1902-1908), Rilke bared his soul and shared profound insights about creativity, solitude, reflection, relationships, sexuality, the soul, love, and life. The book is an absolute masterpiece. Each letter deeply touches the reader’s soul; after reading a letter, one is left with the impression of having had a deep conversation with a caring friend or mentor.

Like any great literary work, the author’s wisdom is reaped from the seeds of life experience that have landed on fertile soil and barren rock. “Do not assume that he who seeks to comfort you now, lives untroubled among the simple and quiet words that sometimes do you good,” explains Rilke in an early letter. “His life may also have much sadness and difficulty, that remains far beyond yours. Were it otherwise, he would never have been able to find these words.” Indeed these eloquent words, so full of insight and compassion (not to mention, kindness to a stranger), are timeless — connecting with and inspiring new generations of readers.

Kappus published the ten letters in 1929, three years after Rilke died, in a short book titled, “Letters to a Young Poet.” In the book’s introduction, Kappus shares the details of his correspondence with Rilke. Kappus understood that he was simply the steward for these letters — the letters really belong to the world. “Important alone are the ten letters… important also for the many who are growing and evolving now and shall in the future. When a truly great and unique spirit speaks, the lesser ones must be silent.” We are indebted to Kappus generous and beautiful gift to the world (particularly in a modern world where correspondence has been reduced to frivolous textese banter); but now, we must be humbly silent and allow Rilke’s inspirational words to soar:

“Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage. Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, something helpless that wants our love.”

“Love consists of this: two solitudes that meet, protect and greet each other. ”

“Love is something difficult and it is more difficult than other things because in other conflicts nature herself enjoins men to collect themselves, to take themselves firmly in the hand with all their strength, while in the heightening of love the impulse is to give oneself wholly away.”

“To love is good, too: love being difficult. For one human being to love another: that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks, the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation.”

“Love is at first not anything that means merging, giving over and uniting with another… it is a high inducement to the individual to ripen, to become world, to become world for himself for another’s sake. It is a great exacting claim upon him, something that chooses him out and calls him to vast things.”

“Only someone who is ready for everything, who doesn’t exclude any experience, even the most incomprehensible, will live the relationship with another person as something alive and will himself sound the depths of his own being.”

“Believe in a love that is being stored up for you like an inheritance, and have faith that in this love there is a strength and a blessing so large that you can travel as far as you wish without having to step outside it.”

“A person isn’t who they are during the last conversation you had with them — they’re who they’ve been throughout your whole relationship.”

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”

“No one can advise or help you — no one. There is only one thing you should do. Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write.”

“Most people come to know only one corner of their room, one spot near the window, one narrow strip on which they keep walking back and forth.”

“If your daily life seems poor, do not blame it; blame yourself, tell yourself that you are not poet enough to call forth its riches; for to the creator there is no poverty and no poor indifferent place.”

“No experience has been too unimportant, and the smallest event unfolds like a fate, and fate itself is like a wonderful, wide fabric in which every thread is guided by an infinitely tender hand and laid alongside another thread and is held and supported by a hundred others.”

“If you trust in Nature, in the small Things that hardly anyone sees and that can so suddenly become huge, immeasurable; if you have this love for what is humble and try very simply, as someone who serves, to win the confidence of what seems poor: then everything will become easier for you, more coherent and somehow more reconciling… in your innermost awareness, awakeness, and knowledge.”

“Love your solitude and try to sing out with the pain it causes you. For those who are near you are far away… and this shows that the space around you is beginning to grow vast…. be happy about your growth, in which of course you can’t take anyone with you, and be gentle with those who stay behind.”

“The necessary thing is after all but this; solitude, great inner solitude. Going into oneself for hours meeting no one – this one must be able to attain.”

“Why do you want to shut out of your life any uneasiness, any misery, any depression, since after all you don’t know what work these conditions are doing inside you? Why do you want to persecute yourself with the question of where all this is coming from and where it is going? Since you know, after all, that you are in the midst of transitions and you wished for nothing so much as to change.”

“Don’t be too quick to draw conclusions from what happens to you; simply let it happen. Otherwise it will be too easy for you to look with blame… at your past, which naturally has a share with everything that now meets you.”

“Sex is difficult; yes. But those tasks that have been entrusted to us are difficult; almost everything serious is difficult; and everything is serious. If you just recognize this and manage, out of yourself, out of your own talent and nature, out of your own experience and childhood and strength, to achieve a wholly individual relation to sex (one that is not influenced by convention and custom), then you will no longer have to be afraid of losing yourself and becoming unworthy of your dearest possession.”

“Physical pleasure is a sensual experience no different from pure seeing or the pure sensation with which a fine fruit fills the tongue; it is a great unending experience, which is given us, a knowing of the world, the fullness and the glory of all knowing. And not our acceptance of it is bad; the bad thing is that most people misuse and squander this experience and apply it as a stimulant at the tired spots of their lives and as distraction instead of a rallying toward exalted moments.”

“Perhaps the great renewal of the world will consist of this, that man and woman, freed of all confused feelings and desires, shall no longer seek each other as opposites, but simply as members of a family and neighbors, and will unite as human beings, in order to simply, earnestly, patiently, and jointly bear the heavy responsibility of sexuality that has been entrusted to them.”

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For further reading: Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke Translated by Joan Burnham, New World Library (1992). There is also a translation by Stephen Mitchell (Modern Library, 2001) and Mark Harman (Harvard Press, 2011).
Life of a Poet: Rainer Maria Rilke by Ralph Freedman, FSG (1996).

Letters from Famous Fathers to Their Children

06/18/202306/18/2023 / Alexander Atkins

alex atkins bookshelf wisdom Today we celebrate Father’s Day by examining what fathers often do best: sharing unsolicited, but timely, advice to their children. Although in today’s world, fatherly advice is often shared by a tweet or message, there was a time when fathers took the time to sit down and write out their words of wisdom based on their life experience, hoping that it will not fall on deaf ears and provide some valuable insights and guidance.

The first letter, dated November 10, 1958, is from John Steinbeck (1902-1968) to his eldest son, Thomas (Thom), on the nature of mature love. At the time, Thom was a teenager attending a boarding school in the East Coast. It is interesting to note that Thom had a very good relationship with his father, but not with his mother; he explained in an interview in 2004: “My mother was difficult, to put it lightly. She was a drinker. And the only way my father could save me from her was to put me into boarding schools on the East Coast from the time I was in third grade.” At some point in 1958, Thom told his father that he had fallen in love with a girl named Susan. Steinbeck addressed the issue of love in this eloquent and thoughtful letter:

Dear Thom:

We had your letter this morning. I will answer it from my point of view and of course Elaine will from hers.

First — if you are in love — that’s a good thing — that’s about the best thing that can happen to anyone. Don’t let anyone make it small or light to you.

Second — There are several kinds of love. One is a selfish, mean, grasping, egotistical thing which uses love for self-importance. This is the ugly and crippling kind. The other is an outpouring of everything good in you — of kindness and consideration and respect — not only the social respect of manners but the greater respect which is recognition of another person as unique and valuable. The first kind can make you sick and small and weak but the second can release in you strength, and courage and goodness and even wisdom you didn’t know you had.

You say this is not puppy love. If you feel so deeply — of course it isn’t puppy love.

But I don’t think you were asking me what you feel. You know better than anyone. What you wanted me to help you with is what to do about it — and that I can tell you.

Glory in it for one thing and be very glad and grateful for it.

The object of love is the best and most beautiful. Try to live up to it.

If you love someone — there is no possible harm in saying so — only you must remember that some people are very shy and sometimes the saying must take that shyness into consideration.

Girls have a way of knowing or feeling what you feel, but they usually like to hear it also.

It sometimes happens that what you feel is not returned for one reason or another — but that does not make your feeling less valuable and good.

Lastly, I know your feeling because I have it and I’m glad you have it.

We will be glad to meet Susan. She will be very welcome. But Elaine will make all such arrangements because that is her province and she will be very glad to. She knows about love too and maybe she can give you more help than I can.

And don’t worry about losing. If it is right, it happens — The main thing is not to hurry. Nothing good gets away.

Love, Fa [John Steinbeck]

________________________________________

This second letter is from William Edward Burghardt Du Bois (better known as W. E. B. Du Bois, 1868-1963) to his daughter, Yolande. The year was 1914, when Yolande, the 14 years old, left home to attend Bedales, a boarding school located in Petersfield in Hampshire, England:

Dear Little Daughter:

I have waited for you to get well settled before writing. By this time I hope some of the strangeness has worn off and that my little girl is working hard and regularly.

Of course, everything is new and unusual. You miss the newness and smartness of America. Gradually, however, you are going to sense the beauty of the old world: its calm and eternity and you will grow to love it.

Above all remember, dear, that you have a great opportunity. You are in one of the world’s best schools, in one of the world’s greatest modern empires. Millions of boys and girls all over this world would give almost anything they possess to be where you are. You are there by no desert or merit of yours, but only by lucky chance.

Deserve it, then. Study, do your work. Be honest, frank and fearless and get some grasp of the real values of life. You will meet, of course, curious little annoyances. People will wonder at your dear brown and the sweet crinkley hair. But that simply is of no importance and will soon be forgotten. Remember that most folk laugh at anything unusual, whether it is beautiful, fine or not. You, however, must not laugh at yourself. You must know that brown is as pretty as white or prettier and crinkley hair as straight even though it is harder to comb. The main thing is the YOU beneath the clothes and skin—the ability to do, the will to conquer, the determination to understand and know this great, wonderful, curious world. Don’t shrink from new experiences and custom. Take the cold bath bravely. Enter into the spirit of your big bed-room. Enjoy what is and not pine for what is not. Read some good, heavy, serious books just for discipline: Take yourself in hand and master yourself. Make yourself do unpleasant things, so as to gain the upper hand of your soul.

Above all remember: your father loves you and believes in you and expects you to be a wonderful woman.

I shall write each week and expect a weekly letter from you.

Lovingly yours,

Papa

________________________________________

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The Wisdom of Edgar Allan Poe

06/02/2023 / Alexander Atkins

alex atkins bookshelf wisdom Edgar Allan Poe is recognized as not only the master of the morbid and the macabre, but also as a masterful short story writer and the inventor of the detective genre. But he also wrote poetry, essays, letters, and nonfiction. (As an aside, the story of Poe’s death is truly puzzling — as if lifted right out of one of his short stories. More than 160 years later, Poe’s death remains one of the most mysterious deaths in literary history. You can read about here.) Recently, the editors of Poe Knows: A Miscellany of Macabre Musings, reviewed the Poe canon to present some of his best musings. In the introduction, they wrote, “Poe was a master of the bon mot… This volume collects more than 200 quotes, aphorisms, and Poesque displays of verbal virtuosity, culled from his [work]… If the quotes compiled for this volume show anything, it is the scope of Poe’s intellect and the brilliance with which he commented on everything from the character of genius to the complexity of coincidence, the speciousness of spirituality, and the perversity of human nature.” Here some notable musings from the master:

That pleasure which is at once the most intense, the most elevating, and the most pure, is, I believe, found in the contemplation of the beautiful. (from The Philosophy of Composition)

Our present incarnation is progressive, preparatory, temporary. Our future is perfected, ultimate, immortal. The ultimate life is the full design. (from Mesmeric Revelation)

The boundaries which divide life from death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and where the other begins? (From The Premature Burial)

It is by no means an irrational fancy that, in a future existence, we shall look upon what we think our present existence, as a dream. (From Marginalia)

In the strange anomaly of my existence, feelings with me, had never been of the heart, and my passions always were of the mind. (From Berenice)

There are chords in the hearts of most reckless which cannot be touched without emotion. (From the Masque of the Red Death)

Near neighbors are seldom friends. (From Metzengerstein)

Most writers — poets in especial — prefer having it understood that they compose by a species of fine frenzy. (From The Philosophy of Composition)

Upon mankind at large the events of very early existence rarely leave in mature age any definite impression. (From William Wilson)

It is a trait in the perversity of human nature to reject the obvious and the ready, for the far-distant and equivocal. (From Loss of Breath)

To the substance of terror he was sufficiently alive, but of its shadows he had no apprehension. (From The Sphinx)

What you mistake for madness is but over acuteness of the senses (From The Tell-Tale Heart)

Poetry and truth are one. (From Eureka)

I make no exception, even in Dante’s favor — the only thing well said of Purgatory, is that a man may go farther and fare worse. (From Marginalia)

The greater amount of truth is impulsively uttered; thus the greater amount is spoken, not written. (From Marginalia)

The true genius shudders at incompleteness — imperfection — and usually prefers silence to saying the something which is not every thing that should be said. (From Marginalia)

No thought can perish, so no act is without infinite result. (From The Power of Words)

In the few furrows upon his check I read the fables of sorrow, and weariness, and disgust with mankind, and a longing after solitude. (From Silence — A Fable)

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Best Commencement Speeches: Tom Hanks

05/27/202306/02/2023 / Alexander Atkins / Leave a comment

On May 25, 2023, American actor, director, producer, and writer Tom Hanks delivered the 372nd commencement speech at Harvard University to more than 9,000 graduates. Hanks, who is the fourth-highest-grossing actor in America, received an honorary doctor of arts degree and a Wilson volleyball with the Harvard logo as a homage to his beloved friend, “Wilson,” in the film Castaway (2000). Forefront on Hanks’ mind was the assault on truth that is dominated the United States over the last decade. His speech is set against the backdrop of memorable news stories like Trump’s never-ending claims of a stolen Presidential election, fake news, and witch hunts; the debut of “alternative facts”; the Fox News-Dominion settlement for reporting the falsehoods that conservative viewers wanted to hear, the devastating opioid crisis that falsely promoted “nonaddictive” drugs, George Santos’ outrageous campaign of lies, and so forth. Perhaps Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer back in 2018, summed it up best during an interview on NBC’s Meet the Press (August 19, 2018): “Truth isn’t truth.” A few days earlier Guiliani told Chris Cuomo on Cuomo Prime Live (August 15, 2018): “[Facts] are in the eye of the beholder.” When Cuomo responded, “No, facts are not in the eye of the beholder,” Giulani stated, “Yes it is — yes they are. Nowadays they are.” Think on that: nowadays they are. Hence, Hanks laments that it has come to this — truth has lost its value in modern society: “For the truth to some is no longer empirical. It’s no longer based on data, nor common sense, nor even common decency… Telling the truth is no longer the benchmark for public service. It’s no longer the salve to our fears, or the guide to our actions. Truth is now considered malleable, by opinion and by zero-sum endgames.” Later he notes, “Truth is mined at the intersections of our chosen behaviors and our fixed habits in our personal boundaries… The truth is sacred, unalterable, chiseled into the stone of the foundation of our republic. ” James Comey, former director of the FBI, said it this way (August 19, 2018): “Truth exists and truth matters. Truth has always been the touchstone of our country’s justice system and political life. People who lie are held accountable. If we are untethered to truth, our justice system cannot function and a society based on the rule of law dissolves.”

Here are some excerpts from Hanks’ commencement speech:

“We all have special powers and abilities far beyond the reach of other mortals. Some of us can repair a screen door with ease. Some of us can take care of a five-year-old kid and a toddler for 24 hours a day and never stop loving them. Some of us make sense of physics and economics and global policy. Some of us survive somehow on minimum earnings. Some of us graduate from colleges despite years of lockdowns and Zooms. Now these achievements are all stellar, even though yes, we are all but human. Still, we’d like to look up in the sky and see not a bird, not a plane, but well, someone who is young and strong and super who will fight the never ending battle for truth, for justice and for the American way. Someone who will take on that work…

Veritas. The language of telling the truth. It is the in the vision quest for truth that we look to you newly incorporated members of the Justice League of Avengers to come to the rescue. For the truth to some is no longer empirical. It’s no longer based on data nor common sense, nor even common decency. Telling the truth is no longer the benchmark for public service. It’s no longer the salve to our fears or the guide to our actions. Truth is now considered malleable by opinion and by zero-sum endgames. Imagery is manufactured with audacity and with purpose to achieve the primal task of marring the truth with mock logic, to achieve with fake expertise, with false sincerity, with phrases like, ‘I’m just saying. Well, I’m just asking. I’m just wondering.’

Now, literally you cannot believe your eyes and your ears will help others lie to you. Someone will report the world to you exactly as you wish it were full of alternative facts, of conjured narrative meant to buttress the status quo and deny its offenses or rejig the rules and muddy the playing field, depending on where one is on the food chain and the moral spectrum. The American way can be demonstrated without ceasing as a perpetual prayer by every big shot in any plain Jane or Joe Blow. Justice can be an everyday pursuit case by case, with both lightning speed and the slow inevitable effect of gravity. Truth though Lord, truth. Truth feeds up in the high country as elusive as serenity, yet as certain as the North Star and the Southern Cross. Truth is mined at the intersections of our chosen behaviors and our fixed habits in our personal boundaries.

Truth has synonyms such as honesty, honor, transparency. And yet, the common practice of so many is to play fast and loose with those very words, to create enemies, to claim victimhood, to raise the mediocre into merit and to make cloudy a vista that is actually crystal clear. Likewise, truth has opposites. Omission. You don’t need to know that. Distraction. That’s not the real story, this is. Opinion. Masquerading as clairvoyance. ‘Oh, here’s what is going to happen.’ And influence pedaling. A lot of people are saying truth too has a nemesis equal to any colored kryptonite. That lack of feral hound is never too far off the path in the weeds and in the shadows, lying in wait for the lethal opportunity to bring truth down. And that beast is indifference, which will make moot all the permanence found in truth. Indifference will rust away the promise of our promised land. Propaganda and bald face lies will erode over time. Idolatry and imagery lose luster in effect. Ignorance and intolerance can be replaced by experience in the wink of an eye, but indifference will narrow the vision of America’s people and make dim the light of Lady Liberty’s symbolic torch. Indifference make citizens into indentured servants held in labor by the despots and tyrants whose default setting is cynicism, who outlawed dissent and banned art and dialogue and books. Who grab power any way they can enabled by the subterfuge of their co-conspirators, rewarding their rationale of the complicit, and surging into the vacuum caused by the indifference of a people who have been made weary by struggle, so weary that they lose hope and are left to yearn to be saved by the fiction of superheroes. Every day, every year, and for every graduating class, there is a choice to be made.

It’s the same option for all grownups who have to decide to be one of three types of Americans, those who embrace liberty and freedom for all, those who won’t, or those who are indifferent. Only the first do the work of creating a more perfect union and nation indivisible. The others get in the way. And the never ending battle you have all officially joined as of today, the difference is in how truly you believe and in how vociferously you promote, and how tightly you hold to the truth that is self-evident, that of course we are all created equally yet differently. And of course, we are all in this together. If we do the work, justice and the American way are within our grasp, no matter our gender, our faith, our station, our heritage or genetic makeup, the shade and hue of our flesh, or the continental birthplace of our ancestors.

Why is that truth so hard for some to accept, much less respect? If you live in the United States of America, the responsibility is yours, ours. The effort is optional, but the truth. The truth is sacred, unalterable, chiseled into the stone of the foundation of our republic. All of us, none of us are super. We are the Americans. Liberty and justice is for us all because yes, we have specific names and we have lived every year of our ages. But when it comes to race, we are all uniquely, magnificently, simply human…

May goodness and mercy follow you all the days, all the days of your lives. God speed. Congratulations.”

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For further reading: http://www.rev.com/blog/transcripts/tom-hanks-gives-2023-harvard-commencement-speech-transcript

The Best Graduation Advice: 2023

05/11/202305/11/2023 / Alexander Atkins

alex atkins bookshelf quotations It’s that time of year when excited graduates don their cap and gown and patiently sit on folding chairs on an expansive lawn to listen to the sage advice of the guest speaker invited to their commencement ceremony. Book publishers are very aware of this annual event and publish books that they hope will be purchased as keepsakes of graduates’ academic milestone. Although most books in this category contain complete commencement speeches or long excerpts, Clarkson Potter took a different approach with their recent book, Carpe Every Diem: The Best Graduation Advice from More Than 100 Commencement Speeches. The beautifully-designed, small-format book contains 100 quotations and short passages from speeches of famous academics, actors, athletes, authors, entrepreneurs, philanthropists, poets, politicians, and poets. The book poses the question: “Okay, you’ve graduated. Commencement is over. But how will the rest of your life commence? I should note: advice from real people should be truly cherished because it is only a matter of time when commencement speeches will be written by ChatGPT. Without further ado, here are some pearls of wisdom from true mortals:

Michael Dell: “As you start your journey, the first thing you should do is throw away that store-bought map and begin to draw your own.”

George Saunders: “What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness. Those moments when another human being was there, in front of me, suffering, and I responded… sensibly. Reservedly. Mildly… As a goal in life… Try to be kinder.”

Toni Morrison: “You are your own stories and therefore free to imagine and experience what it means to be human without wealth. What it feels to be human without domination over others, without reckless arrogance, without fear of others unlike you, without rotating, rehearsing, and reinventing the hatreds you learned in the sandbox. And even though you don’t have complete control over the narrative… you could nevertheless create it.”

Anna Quindlen: “Don’t ever confuse the two: your life and your work. The second is only part of the first.”

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: “Life is short really means do something… Life is short really means have a purpose. And purpose does not need to be grand. I think that the smaller the purpose, the more meaningful. To be kind. To have empathy. To avoid sanctimony. To think of the humanity of other people — to try.

Steve Jobs: “Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the result of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions down out your own inner voice.”

Billy Collins: “The corollary to carpe diem is gratitude, gratitude for simply being alive, for having a day to seize.”

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The Wisdom of Mothers

03/23/202303/23/2023 / Alexander Atkins

alex atkins bookshelf books When you hear the words National Geographic, what do you think of? If you are like most people, you instantly think of the scholarly journal with the iconic yellow border featuring stories about geography, history, nature, and archaeology, right? Well imagine my surprise when I was at an independent bookstore and picked up a copy of A Mother’s Book of Blessings: A Treasury of Wisdom for Life’s Greatest Moments by Natasha Tabori Fried that was featured on a table of “wisdom” books — a topic I feature often on this blog. Typically a book like this is published by Sterling, Chronicle Books, Random House, or Adams Media — but no, this small tome was published by National Geographic. It is a beautifully designed book, measuring only 6.75 by 6.75 inches, running 352 pages and filled with time-honored wisdom in the form of proverbs, parables, quotations, and short poems. These pearls of wisdom are organized into 12 themes: motherhood, new baby, mealtime, bedtime, birthdays, holidays, travel, nature, graduation, wedding, housewarming, and gratitude. In the introduction, Fried writes about the meaning and importance of blessings: “A blessing is like a wish, but a wish for some else. In the context of this book, blessings are wishes mothers offer their children throughout their lives, in moments big and small.” Here are some selected blessings:

Chinese proverb: One generation plants the trees / Another gets the shade.

e.e. cummings: You are my sun, my moon and all of my stars.

Native American blessing: When you were born, you cried and the world rejoiced / Live your life in such a way that when you die, the world cries and you rejoice.

J. M. Barrie: You know that place between sleep and awake, that place where you can still remember dreaming? That’s where I will always love you, that’s where I will be waiting.

Rainer Maria Rilke: And now we welcome the new year; full of things that have never been.

C. S. Lewis: There are far better things ahead than any we leave behind.

Henry David Thoreau: If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.

Confucius: Wherever you go, go with all your heart.

St. Ignatius of Loyola: Go forth and set the world on fire.

Antoine de Saint-Exupery: Love does not consist in gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction.

Arabic proverb: Gratitude takes three forms: A feeling in the heart, an expression in words, and a giving in return.

Native American Ten Commandments:

Treat the Earth and all that dwell thereon with respect.
Remain close to the Great (Creator) Spirit.
Show great respect for your fellow beings.
Work together for the benefit of all mankind.
Give assistance and kindness wherever needed.
Do what you know to be right.
Look after the well-being of mind and body.
Dedicate a share of your efforts to the greater good.
Be truthful and honest at all times.
Take full responsibility for your actions

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Why Humans are Poorer than the Bees

02/19/202302/20/2023 / Alexander Atkins

alex atkins bookshelf wisdom “In Tibet we say that many illness can be cured by the one medicine of love and compassion. These qualities are the ultimate source of human happiness, and need for them lies at the very core of our being. Unfortunately, love and compassion have been omitted from too many spheres of social interaction for too long. Usually confined to family and home, their practice in public life is considered impractical, even naive. This is tragic. In my view point, the practice of compassion is not just a symptom of unrealistic idealism but the most effective way to pursue the best interest of others as well as our own. The more we — as a nation, a group or as individuals – depend upon others, the more it is in our own best interests to ensure their well-being.

Practicing altruism is the real source of compromise and cooperation; merely recognizing our need for harmony is not enough. A mind committed to compassion is like an overflowing reservoir — a constant source of energy, determination and kindness. This is like a seed; when cultivated, gives rise to many other good qualities, such as forgiveness, tolerance, inner strength and the confidence to overcome fear and insecurity. The compassionate mind is like an elixir; it is capable of transforming bad situation into beneficial ones. Therefore, we should not limit our expressions of love and compassion to our family and friends. Nor is the compassion only the responsibility of clergy, health care and social workers. It is the necessary business of every part of the human community.

Whether a conflict lies in the field of politics, business or religion, an altruistic approach is frequently the sole means of resolving it. Sometimes the very concepts we use to meditate a dispute are themselves the cause of the problem. At such times, when a resolution seems impossible, both sides should recall the basic human nature that unites them. This will help break the impasse and, in the long run, make it easier for everyone to attain their goal. Although neither side may be fully satisfied, if both make concessions, at the very least, the danger of further conflict will be averted. We all know that this form of compromise is the most effective way of solving problems – why, then, do we not use it more often?

When I consider the lack of cooperation in human society, I can only conclude that it stems from ignorance of our interdependent nature. I am often moved by the example of small insects, such as bees. The laws of nature dictate that bees work together in order to survive. As a result, they possess an instinctive sense of social responsibility. They have no constitution, laws, police, religion or moral training, but because of their nature they labour faithfully together. Occasionally they may fight, but in general the whole colony survives on the basis of cooperation. Human beings, on the other hand, have constitutions, vast legal systems and police forces; we have religion, remarkable intelligence and a heart with great capacity to love. But despite our many extraordinary qualities, in actual practice we lag behind those small insects; in some ways, I feel we are poorer than the bees…

To me, it is clear: a genuine sense of responsibility can result only if we develop compassion. Only a spontaneous feeling of empathy for others can really motivate us to act on their behalf.”

Excerpt from The Global Community and the Need for Universal Responsibility (2015) by The Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of the Tibetan people. The excerpt also appears in A Conversation with The Dalai Lama on Money, Politics, and Life As It Could Be (2016) by The Dalai Lama with Fabien Ouaki. In 1989, The Dalai Lama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize “for advocating peaceful solutions based upon tolerance and mutual respect in order to preserve the historical and cultural heritage of his people. The Dalai Lama has developed his philosophy of peace from a great reverence for all things living and upon the concept of universal responsibility embracing all mankind as well as nature… The Dalai Lama has come forward with constructive and forward-looking proposals for the solution of international conflicts, human rights issues, and global environmental problems.”

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For further reading: http://www.dalailama.com/messages/world-peace/the-medicine-of-altruism

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Little Books, Big Ideas: Inspiring Quotes About Writing

02/01/202302/01/2023 / Alexander Atkins / Leave a comment

In my periodic visits to used bookstores, I recently came across such a thought-provoking little book: The Wit and Wisdom of Women edited by the editors of Running Press, published in1993. Founded in 1972 by Stuart and Larry Teacher, Running Press specialized in small books that could be purchased as gifts.

In the introduction of The Wit and Wisdom of Women, the editors write: “The book you hold is a celebration of women’s lives, at once funny, poignant, passionate, and irrepressibly joyful… Many of these women, bound by time, place, and circumstance, could not possibly have conversed during their lifetimes — but that doesn’t mean we can’t delight in a spirited dialogue of our own making… These unexpected meetings of the mind affirm the universal quality of experience.” Here are some inspiring quotes about writing:

“We rely upon the poets, the philosophers, and the playwrights to articulate what most of us can only feel, in joy or sorrow. They illuminate the thoughts for which we only grope; they give us the strength and balm we cannot find in ourselves. Whenever I feel my courage wavering, I rush to them. They give me the wisdom of acceptance, the will and resiliance to push on.”
From A Gift of Joy (1965) by Helen Hayes

“A thing is incredible, if ever, only after it is told — returned to the world it came out of.”
From the short story “No Place for You, My Love” (1952) by Eudora Welty

“We inherit a great responsibility as well for we must give voice to centuries not only of silent bitterness and hate but also of neighborly kindness and sustaining love.”
From The Third Life of Grange Copeland (1970) by Alice Walker

“Although some use stories as entertainment alone, tales are, in their oldest sense, a healing art. Some are called to this healing art, and the best, to my lights, are those who have lain with the story and found all its matching parts inside themselves and its depth… In the best tellers I know, the stories grow out of their lives like roots grow a tree. The stories have grown them, from them into who they are.”
From Women Who Run with Wolves (1989) by Clarissa Pinkola Estes

“When you write, you lay out a line of words. The line of words is a miner’s pick, a woodcarver’s gouge, a surgeon’s probe. You wield it, and it digs a path you follow. Soon you find yourself deep in new territory. Is it a dead end, or have you located the real subject? You will know tomorrow, or this time next year. You make the path boldly and follow it fearfully. You go where the path leads. At the end of the path, you find a box canyon. You hammer out reports, dispatch bulletins. The writing has changed, in your hands, and in a twinkling, from an expression of your notions to an epistemological tool. The new place interests you because it is not clear. You attend. In your humility, you lay down the words carefully, watching all the angles. Now the earlier writing looks soft and careless. Process is nothing; erase your tracks. The path is not the work. I hope your tracks have grown over; I hope birds ate the crumbs; I hope you will toss it all and not look back.”
From The Writing Life (1989) by Annie Dillard

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What Can Dickens’ A Christmas Carol Teach Us?

12/26/2022 / Alexander Atkins / Leave a comment

Students of literature, indeed anyone who loves books and stories, can agree on one universal truth — that, in the words of C. S. Lewis “we read to know that we are not alone.” Novelist and essayist James Baldwin adds: “You read something which you thought only happened to you, and you discover that it happened 100 years ago to Dostoevsky. This is a very great liberation for the suffering, struggling person, who always thinks that he is alone.”

Another universal truth is that we read to learn, to heal, and to transform ourselves. As George Dawson, an English literature lecturer and founder of the Shakespeare Memorial Library in Birmingham, observed: “The great consulting room of a wise man is a library… the solemn chamber in which man can take counsel with all that have been wise and great and good and glorious amongst the men that have gone before him.”

On this day after Christmas, we turn our attention to a ghostly little story that has much to teach: Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol — a story of about redemption, forgiveness, and generosity. But Dickens did not write A Christmas Carol simply to amuse us; he wrote it to inspire self-reflection and change — to help us become better human beings. “Beyond entertaining us,” writes Bob Welch in 52 Little Life Lessons From A Christmas Carol, “Dickens wanted to make us uncomfortable, because it’s only after we get a touch uneasy with ourselves that we open ourselves to change… to create a spark that might lead to flames of action: changing how we look at the world, changing how we act in the world, and ultimately changing how we will be remembered in the world.” Indeed, if we are able to transform ourselves, in light of the lessons from Dickens’s classic story, this is the Christmas miracle.

Bookshelf presents some important life lessons from A Christmas Carol gleaned from Welch’s enlightening little book:

Don’t be selfish
Don’t let people steal your joy
See life as a child
Everyone has value
Life isn’t just about business
You make the chains that shackle you
Humility enhances vision
To heal you must feel
Your actions affect others
The love of money costs you in the end
Life is best lived when you are awake
Learning begins with listening
Attitude is everything
The past can be empowering
Don’t return evil for evil
Bitterness will poison you
Dying lonely is the result of living lonely
Pain is the privilege of losing someone you care deeply about
Amid tragedy, others still need you
Before honor comes humility
Give because you have been given to
Giving changes your perspective
Live with the end in mind
It is never too late to change
Be the change you want to see

In A Christmas Carol, Dickens gives us one of the most famous endings in literature, highlighting the fact that the holidays present a special opportunity for redemption, the chance to be a better human being:

“Scrooge was better than his word. He did it all, and infinitely more; and to Tiny Tim, who did not die, he was a second father. He became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough, in the good old world. Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh, and little heeded them; for he was wise enough to know that nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter in the outset; and knowing that such as these would be blind anyway, he thought it quite as well that they should wrinkle up their eyes in grins, as have the malady in less attractive forms. His own heart laughed: and that was quite enough for him.

He had no further intercourse with Spirits, but lived upon the Total Abstinence Principle, ever afterwards; and it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!”

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For further reading: 52 Little Lessons From A Christmas Carol by Bob Welch (2015)

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The Wisdom of Ralph Waldo Emerson

11/21/202211/21/2022 / Alexander Atkins

alex atkins bookshelf wisdom Do you recall who wrote this famous line: “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds”? If you answered Ralph Waldo Emerson you can pat yourself on the back. Well done, you! The latest edition of Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations (Nineteenth Edition) features five full pages of quotations from one of America’s most famous writers and philosophers. Consider that Emerson’s content exceeds the contributions of two other prolific American authors: Mark Twain (3.5 pages) and John Steinbeck (.5 pages). Even more impressive is the number you see when you search “Best Emerson Quotations” on the internet: 18.5 million results! Therefore, it can be reasonably argued that Emerson is one of the most quoted American writers — and for good reason. “If Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton and Franklin are our Founding Fathers, Ralph Waldo Emerson is our Founding Thinker,” writes Emerson scholar Richard Geldard. “Born in 1803 in Boston, Emerson became in his lifetime America’s seer and prophet. His collected works, including poems, essays, and extensive journals not only inspired such notable figures as Henry David Thoreau, William James, Walt Whitman, Herman Melville, and numerous nineteenth and twentieth century poets, painters, and musicians, but also a wide readership of ordinary Americans who found in Emerson a teacher of profound depth and idealism… Emerson was the conscience of his nation and a man of great moral courage.”

The previous excerpt appears in the introduction to Emphatically Emerson: Gems From the Journals of Ralph Waldo Emerson edited by Frank Crocitto. Although there are many worthy collections of Emerson’s quotations both in print and on the internet, Crocitto’s collection is unique because it presents Emerson through the thoughts expressed in his journals. The editor has arranged them chronologically and has included Emerson’s age at the time of writing. The first entry is dated 1820, when Emerson was 17; the last from 1874 when he was 71 (he lived until 1882, aged 78). Here are some notable quotations.

“When the whole nation is roaring Patriotism at the top of its voice, I am fain to explore the cleanness of its hands and purity of its heart.” (1824, age 21)

“All the mistakes I make arise from forsaking my own station and trying to see the object from another person’s point of view.” (1834, age 30)

“Be an opener of doors for such as come after thee, and do not try to make the universe a blind alley.” (1844, age 41)

“Do the duty of the day. Just now, the supreme public duty of all thinking men is to assert freedom.. Go where it is threatened, and say, “I am for it. and do not wish to live in the world a moment longer than it exists.'” (1861, age 57)

“Within, I do not find wrinkles and used heart, but unspent youth.” (1864, age 61)

“The secret of poetry is never explained, is always new. We have not got farther than mere wonder at the delicacy of touch, and the eternity it inherits.” (1874, age 71)

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What is the Paradox of Love?

11/11/2022 / Alexander Atkins

alex atkins bookshelf wisdom

“Love occupies a central place in people’s expectations and wishes, but these often remain unfulfilled,” writes philosophy professor Aaron Ben-Zeev (“The Love Paradox,” Psychology Today, April 21, 2013). “Love songs, novels, and movies have emphasized the great hopes and profound happiness associated with love, as well as the great disappointments and profound pain that love generates. Our hearts are enlarged by love, but by the same token, they can also be broken.” Ah, the paradox of love…

Over the years, several networks have discovered that love — with its inherent complexities and paradoxes — is incredibly entertaining. Millions of viewers strap onto the rollercoaster of love to virtually experience its inevitable highs and lows through the lives of those brave (or foolish, depending on your perspective) enough to appear on reality-shows like The Bachelor, The Bachelorette, Love at First Sight, Love is Blind, and their ilk. The viewers become, in some respects, like couple therapists who can observe the profound range of emotions associated with love. But alas, love is inherently paradoxical — something that psychologists and philosophers have observed and written about for decades. Here are some of the key paradoxes of love.

“You will notice that what we are aiming at when we fall in love is a very strange paradox. The paradox consists of the fact that, when we fall in love, we are seeking to re-find all or some of the people to whom we were attached as children. On the other hand, we ask our beloved to correct all of the wrongs that these early parents or siblings inflicted upon us. So that love contains in it the contradiction: The attempt to return to the past and the attempt to undo the past.”
Spoken by Professor Levy in the film, Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989) written and directed by Woody Allen.

“I hold this to be the highest task of a bond between two people: that each should stand guard over the solitude of the other. For, if it lies in the nature of indifference and of the crowd to recognize no solitude, then love and friendship are there for the purpose of continually providing the opportunity for solitude. And only those are the true sharings which rhythmically interrupt periods of deep isolation.” [The paradoxical longing for independence and intimacy with another person.]
Rainer Maria Rilke, Rilke on Love and Other Difficulties (1975)

“In motherly love the relationship between the two person involved in one of inequality; the child is helpless and dependent on the mother. In order to grow, it must become more and more independent, until he does not need mother any more. Thus, the mother-child relationship is paradoxical and, in a sense, tragic. It requires the most intense love on the mother’s side, yet this very love must help the child grow away from the mother, and to become fully independent. It is easy for any mother to love her child before this process of separation has begun — but it is the task in which most fail, to love the child and at the same time to let it go — and to want to let it go.”
Erich Fromm, The Sane Society (1955)

“Paradoxically, the ability to be alone is the condition for the ability to love.”
Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving (1962)

“In love the paradox occurs that two beings become one and yet remain two.”
Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving (1962)

“Love rests on two pillars: surrender and autonomy. Our need for togetherness exists alongside our need for separateness. One does not exist without the other. With too much distance, there can be no connection. But too much merging eradicates the separateness of two distinct individuals. Then there is nothing more to transcend, no bridge to walk on, no one to visit on the other side, no other internal world to enter. When people become fused — when two become one — connection can no longer happen. There is no one to connect with. Thus separateness is a precondition for connection: this is the essential paradox of intimacy and sex.”
Esther Perel, Mating in Captivity (2006)

“The inability to love and accept yourself and your humanity is at the heart of many illnesses. To be loved and accepted, you must start by loving yourself. If you have traits that you consider unlovable, you must love them anyway… it’s a paradox.”
Christiane Northrup, A Daily Dose of Women’s Wisdom (2017)

“Does [being programmed to connect with a significant other] mean that in order to be happy in a relationship we need to be joined with our partner at the hip or give up other aspects of our life such as our careers or friends? Paradoxically, the opposite is true! It turns out that the ability to step into the world on our own often stems from the knowledge that there is someone beside us who we can count on—this is the dependency paradox.”
Amir Levine, Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment and How It Can Help You Find and Keep Your Love (2010)

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For further reading: Famous Misquotations: Blood, Sweat, and Tears
Famous Misquotations: A Civilization is Measured by How It Treats Its Weakest Members
Famous Misquotations: The Two Most Important Days in Your Life
Famous Misquotations: The Triumph of Evil is That Good Men Do Nothing
Famous Phrases You Have Been Misquoting

For further reading: psychologytoday.com/us/blog/in-the-name-love/201304/the-love-paradox

To learn more about Alexander Atkins Design please visit www.alexatkinsdesign.com

Plato: If You Don’t Vote, You Will be Governed by Idiots

11/08/202211/08/2022 / Alexander Atkins / Leave a comment

Plato (427-347 BC) is considered one of the most brilliant and influential philosophers in history. Plato (his given name was Aristocles; Plato is his nickname, from platos, meaning “broad” since he had a broad physique and forehead) was a student of Socrates and took what he learned to found the influential Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the West. Amidst a beautiful grove of olive trees, Plato taught some very fortunate and intelligent students (including Aristotle who later founded his own academy) philosophy, mathematics, politics, and astronomy. His most famous and influential work, that is still widely studied in universities, is the Republic, where Plato cover a broad (pun intended) range of significant topics: philosophy, ethics, moral psychology, epistemology, metaphysics, and of course, political philosophy. It is this last topic that concerns us today as we examine his views on political participation in the context of today’s critical mid-term elections that challenge the fundamental principles of a democracy.

The quote that serves as the title of this post is actually a tongue-in-cheek variation (underscoring the importance of voting in a critical election) of the quote most often attributed to Plato, ubiquitous on the internet: “One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics, is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.” There are many other variants of this famous quotation. Among them is this one crafted by poet and philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson that appears in Society and Solitude (1870): “Plato says that the punishment which the wise suffer who refuse to take part in the government, is, to live under the government of worse men.”

The source of all these variants is The Republic, (Book 1, 346-347), where Plato makes the point that if good, honorable, intelligent men do not to wish to serve in government, then they will be punished by being ruled by those who are bad, dishonorable, and dumb. The actual sentence is: But the chief penalty is to be governed by someone worse if a man will not himself hold office and rule. For those who are curious to partake of the entire discussion of the issue among Socrates (Plato, of course, is speaking through Socrates), Glaucon (Plato’s older brother), and Thrasymachus (a sophist who believes essentially that it does not pay to be just), here is the relevant passage from The Republic:

“Then, Thrasymachus, is not this immediately apparent, that no art or office provides what is beneficial for itself — but as we said long ago it provides and enjoins what is beneficial to its subject, considering the advantage of that, the weaker, and not the advantage the stronger? That was why… I was just now saying that no one of his own will chooses to hold rule and office and take other people’s troubles in hand to straighten them out, but everybody expects pay for that, because he who is to exercise the art rightly never does what is best for himself or enjoins it when he gives commands according to the art, but what is best for the subject. That is the reason, it seems, why pay must be provided for those who are to consent to rule, either in form of money or honor or a penalty if they refuse.” “What do you mean by that, Socrates?” said Glaucon. “The two wages I recognize, but the penalty you speak of and described as a form of wage I don’t understand.” “Then,” said I, “you don’t understand the wages of the best men for the sake of which the finest spirits hold office and rule when they consent to do so. Don’t you know that to be covetous of honor and covetous of money is said to be and is a reproach?” “I do,” he said. “Well, then,” said I, “that is why the good are not willing to rule either for the sake of money or of honor. They do not wish to collect pay openly for their service of rule and be styled hirelings nor to take it by stealth from their office and be called thieves, nor yet for the sake of honor, for they are not covetous of honor. So there must be imposed some compulsion and penalty to constrain them to rule if they are to consent to hold office. That is perhaps why to seek office oneself and not await compulsion is thought disgraceful. But the chief penalty is to be governed by someone worse if a man will not himself hold office and rule. It is from fear of this, as it appears to me, that the better sort hold office when they do, and then they go to it not in the expectation of enjoyment nor as to a good thing, but as to a necessary evil and because they are unable to turn it over to better men than themselves or to their like. For we may venture to say that, if there should be a city of good men only, immunity from office-holding would be as eagerly contended for as office is now, and there it would be made plain that in very truth the true ruler does not naturally seek his own advantage but that of the ruled; so that every man of understanding would rather choose to be benefited by another than to be bothered with benefiting him.”

Tomorrow will decide what kind of government America has. At the close of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, legend has it that as Benjamin Franklin left Independence Hall, he was asked this question: “What have we got — a republic or a monarchy?” Franklin responded, “A republic — if you can keep it.” In 1787 as in 2022, this republic is amazingly fragile. Dr. Richard Beeman, professor of history at the University of Pennsylvania, elaborates: “If there is a lesson in all of this it is that our Constitution is neither a self-actuating nor a self-correcting document. It requires the constant attention and devotion of all citizens… Democratic republics are not merely founded upon the consent of the people, they are also absolutely dependent upon the active and informed involvement of the people for their continued good health.”

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For further reading: The Republic by Plato (translated by Christopher Ellyn-Jones)
Society and Solitude by Ralph Waldo Emerson
https://www.thoughtco.com/all-about-platos-famous-academy-112520
https://www.iep.utm.edu/academy/
https://www.iep.utm.edu/plato/

To learn more about Alexander Atkins Design please visit www.alexatkinsdesign.com

Little Books, Big Ideas: African Proverbs

10/17/202210/26/2022 / Alexander Atkins / Leave a comment

In my periodic visits to used bookstores, I recently came across such a thought-provoking little book: African Wisdom edited by Mary Rodarte and published by Andrews McMeel Publishing in 2003. In the introduction, Rodarte notes: “African proverbs do the work of a school lesson and a story in one. They entertain with humor and wit and open a window onto the social mores and values of a people. And unlike a complicated lesson, they are simple to remember and to pass on. As you read the proverbs… you will become a witness to a chain of humanity that began long before you and will stretch on long after you are gone.” Here are some notable African proverbs:

A friend is like a source of water during a long voyage.

Children are the reward of life.

There are three friends in life: courage, sense, and insight.

Sticks in a bundle are unbreakable.

A village without the elderly is like a tree without roots.

The mouth does not forget what it tasted one time.

The thorn will come out from where it went in.

A stone in the water does not understand how thirsty the hill is.

Before healing others, heal yourself.

The voyager’s path is marked by the stars not the sand dunes.

If you have a lot, give some of your possessions; if you have little, give some of your heart.

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The Wisdom of Strangers at Airports

09/05/202209/23/2022 / Alexander Atkins

alex atkins bookshelf wisdom Although the first thought that comes to people’s minds when they think of airports is annoyance (long lines, lengthy layovers, intrusive security checks, etc.), airports are incredible, magical places. We take it for granted that each day millions of people are transported to far-away places around the globe in hours (and if they are lucky, so will their luggage). If you have watched documentaries about the behind-the-scenes operations at an international airport you will know that the logistics (personnel, equipment, fuel, schedules, meals, connecting flights, luggage handling, maintenance, weather, customer behavior, etc.) will have your head spinning. In short, air travel is like an orchestra where every musician must play their part at exactly the right moment for the right period of time.

The other thing most people take for granted is what an amazing melting pot an airport is. There is no place in a city that has such a diverse group of individuals — people passing through from other parts of the country and the world. Each person — from a specific place, culture, and generation — has lived a life, presumably very different from yours — and has a unique, fascinating story to tell. That individuals sit side by side in the airport lounges or in airplane seats for hours at a time and not share these stories is a lost opportunity to gain perspective and new insights.

A few weeks ago, I sat in an airport in Phoenix, Arizona for a three hour layover to catch a connecting flight to the Bay Area. A sharply dressed woman sitting next to me asked me if I would watch her luggage while she purchased a charger for her phone. She spoke with an unmistakable Texan accent. Upon her return, we began chatting about what brought her to Phoenix and that led to a discussion about business, family, education, and the world. It was a wonderful discussion that helped pass the time, but more importantly, it led to many wonderful insights and perspectives drawn from her life and her journey. One of the most notable thoughts was this: “I wish I could step into a time machine and travel back in time, so that I could give my kids and grandkids the same world I grew up in.” That idea resonated deeply with me. Over the years, I have spoken to so many people who grew up in the 50s and 60s who share this sentiment but have never expressed is so vividly and so succinctly. This was her gift to me.

Earlier in the day, I had taken a flight from Columbus to Phoenix. During the boarding process, a young woman in her early twenties asked if she could sit in the window seat. I noticed she was wearing an Ohio State University sweatshirt. A fascinating, engaging conversation that lasted the entire flight — 3.5 hours — began with a simple question: “Are you currently a student at Ohio State?” I learned that she had graduated a few years ago, worked in the finance industry, and was traveling to visit a college friend in Phoenix. Over the next few hours, our conversation ranged from business, leadership, education, family, family values, documentaries on psychological issues (trust, truth, compliance, obedience, etc.), psychological research, communication, relationships, philanthropy, work ethic, hobbies, self knowledge and self reflection. She was one of ten children, born to parents who lived in one of the toughest, most crime-ridden neighborhoods in Dayton, Ohio. Her salvation came in the form of the discipline, wisdom, kindness, generosity, and deep faith from a matriarchal household. The biggest influence on her was her mother and grandmother who taught her to listen and to discern the difference between people who spoke from the heart (where their words were aligned with their body language and actions) and those who spoke to manipulate or lie (where their words were discordant with their body language). “Those two lessons have served me well throughout my life — that, and my faith,” she explained. Her parents emphasized the importance of faith, education, and a good work ethic. Out of ten siblings, eight attended and graduated from college. The conversation was so genuine, so synergistic — one topic segueing seamlessly from one topic to another — that the hours melted away. At the end of the conversation, she confessed, “I am an introvert, and I generally wouldn’t talk to a stranger. Even with my friends, I tend to be a listener. But this conversation is one of the deepest, broad-ranging, fascinating conversations I have ever had.” We both were grateful for this wonderful exchange of ideas. The only time she reached for her phone was to write down the title of a book or documentary that she didn’t know about. Although this young woman, so early in her life journey and full of opportunities, will likely forget me, I don’t think she will forget the magic of that thoughtful, engaging conversation. When I challenged her to strike up a conversation with a stranger on her flight back home, she smiled and replied, “I will definitely try.” We parted ways when we deplaned and entered the busy airport terminal; I watched as she disappeared into a throng of travelers scurrying along the seemingly infinite concourse, appreciative of her generous gifts: the wisdom gained from her life and the inspiration of her incredible mother and grandmother.

So the next time you are in an airport, manage to get over your annoyance, smile at the person sitting next to you, and strike up a conversation that focuses on your commonalities, not your differences… and watch the magic of communication emerge over time.

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Little Books, Big Ideas: Proverbs From Around the World

08/30/202209/01/2022 / Alexander Atkins / 5 Comments

If you ever travel to Columbus, Ohio, it is worth taking a short trip from the airport to the German Village, just south of the city’s downtown. The neighborhood was settled by a large German immigration that occurred in 1830. The Germans not only brought their culture, they also brought their impressive brick-laying skills — remarkably, the streets, sidewalks, houses, and buildings are all made of brick. In the heart of the German Village you will discover a wonderful bookstore called, appropriately, The Book Loft of German Village. Residing in a pre-Civil War building, the bookstore is an actual labyrinth featuring 32 different rooms on several different levels. Each room, covering a specific subject, is lined with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. If you are a bibliophile, it’s as close to the paradise that Jorge Luis Borges imagined.

In any event, it is while perusing the splendid bookshelves of The Book Loft of German Village that I came across an intriguing little book, Proverbs From Around the World: A Collection of Timeless Wisdom, Wit, Sayings & Advice by Gerd de Ley. In the introduction, the author writes, “Our world is massive. With a scope well beyond what most people can fathom, and certainly too large to be experienced in full during one lifetime, the Earth is full of the experiences and collected wisdom of billions upon billions of people.” It is from this global, multi-generational tapestry of wisdom, that de Ley selects some of history’s most enduring proverbs to share with the reader. Here are some examples (country of origin in parenthesis):

There are three friends in this world: courage, sense, and insight. (Africa)

He who seeks a friend without a fault will not find one. (Armenia)

In times of test, the family is best. (Burma)

To a man wine is like water is to the boat; it can carry him or guzzle him up. (Thailand)

There are forty kinds of lunacy, but only one kind of common sense. (Africa)

To talk without thinking is to shoot without aiming. (England)

When you begin to understand the situation, you know you must have been ill-informed. (Java)

Don’t look where you fell, but where you slipped. (Liberia)

Words are but dwarfs, examples are giants. (Luxembourg)

The eleventh commandment: thou shall not contradict. (Mexico)

If age and experience came at birth, we would have neither youth nor mirth. (Russia)

Wisdom does not come overnight. (Somalia)

A new broom sweeps clean, but an old broom knows the corners. (Virgin Islands)

If you are too modest you will go hungry. (Zaire)

If you don’t know where you are going, look back to where you’ve come from. (Arabia)

Life is half-spent before one knows what life is. (France)

The devil likes to hide behind a cross. (Ukraine)

If we are facing in the right direction, all we have to do is keep on walking. (India)

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A Deceased Father Speaks to His Son Through a Special Book

05/25/202206/10/2022 / Alexander Atkins

alex atkins bookshelf books He couldn’t quite reach it at first — it was almost beyond the reach of his young hands. It didn’t help that it was tucked snugly between several other books — as if they were soldiers protecting one of their ranks. But, at last, the book slid forward. The boy sat down at the base of the towering bookcase and opened the book. A slip of paper, neatly folded, suddenly fell to the floor. His father, who had passed away from cancer years ago, had the habit of placing inside his books related essays and reviews clipped from magazines or printed from the internet. He viewed books not just as static documents to be read but also as portable, dynamic filing systems — like a commonplace book, a place to collect related ideas and inspirations for new intellectual reflections and explorations. Perhaps this was one of those intriguing essays. He carefully unfolded the paper and immediately recognized his father’s neat handwriting; he could clearly hear his father’s voice as he began to read:

My dear boy,
If you are reading this letter it is because you have reached a point in your personal development that this book’s title finally interested you. The book you hold in your hand is one of the great treasures of my life; and just like you, I discovered it rather serendipitously. And that is a part of the intrinsic value of this wonderful book: you must discover it on your own, in your own time. During my lifetime I could not have given it to you because it would have robbed you of this precious, propitious moment — a bibliophilic eureka moment, if you will — one that you will cherish for the rest of your life.

When I was about your age, I recall reading Stephen Crane’s poem, “A Man Said to the Universe.” Despite the poem’s brevity, its meaning is far-reaching and profound: “A man said the universe: / “Sir, I exist!” / “However,” replied the universe, / “The fact has not created in me / A sense of obligation.” I never forgot that poem. Indeed, the world can be indifferent and unfair. Sadly, over my lifetime, I have witnessed a world that has increasingly moved beyond indifference to being intolerant, belligerent, and cruel. Moreover, it troubles me greatly that the nation is so bitterly divided and that the search for Truth has been so maligned — and in many cases, abandoned. There will be times — because you are so perceptive, so sensitive, so reflective — that you will feel that oppressive force on your soul, your thoughts, and being. And then there are times when the tribulations of life wash upon your shores, one after the other, sometimes pushing you to the breaking point. All of this can cause you to doubt your goodness, your purpose, and you can lose sight of what is critical to your life: your values, your dreams, and the unwavering love of your parents that have sustained you since that memorable day you were born. The book you hold in your hands was my salvation during the darkest days of my life when those inevitable sea of troubles caused me to stumble, caused me to stop believing in myself, and diminished my hope for a better world. The reassuring, transformative words in the book’s pages, written by another human being — a complete stranger to me, but a fellow traveler, a kindred soul — brought me back to my self and gently nudged me back onto the journey of my deliberate choices to lead a fulfilling and meaningful life of contribution and purpose.

This particular book and all the books in my library, thoughtfully collected during my lifetime, are yours; however, they are imbued with special meaning. To paraphrase St. Exupery’s wise Little Prince: “All men have books, but they are not the same things for different people… But all these books are silent. You — you alone — will have the books as no else has them — in one of the books I shall be living.” When you read this book,I hope you hear my voice and know that I have never left you. I am right here, living among its pages. May this book provide you with guidance and solace all the days of your life; and know, my dear son, that my love for you is eternal.

Love, Dad

The boy held the note tenderly and sat silently for what seemed an eternity, not wanting the moment to pass, pondering its meaning. With one hand he wiped away his tearstained cheeks, then gently put the note down. He picked up the book and opened it carefully, as if it were a rare museum relic; he began to read. Suddenly, he felt he was no longer alone. The boy could hear his father’s voice as he read each sentence. In that moment, the boy felt the book magically transform in his soft, gentle hands — it was now truly his and it was alive with the spirit of his beloved father.

Excerpt from the forthcoming book Stories from the Bookshelves by Alexander Atkins.

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For further reading: Famous Misquotations: The Two Most Important Days in Your Life
The Wisdom of a Grandmother
Read related posts: Letters to a Young Poet
The Wisdom of Pi Patel
The Wisdom of Hindsight

The Most Important Thing on a Tombstone is the Dash

05/08/202205/08/2022 / Alexander Atkins

alex atkins bookshelf wisdom Linda Ellis (72) started writing as a child. She left the corporate world after a long career to become a full-time poet. Although she was not well-known, in 1994, the host of a syndicated radio show read one of her early poems titled “The Dash.” The inspirational poem truly resonated with listeners and became an instant classic, shared around the world. The poem inspired several books, including The Dash: Making a Difference with Your Life (2017),” which has sold over a million copies, and Live Your Dash: Make Every Moment Matter (2014). The message of the poem is that what matters most in life is not how long you have lived (on a tombstone that is represented by the date of birth and date of death), but rather how you spent your life (represented by the dash, or hyphen, between the dates). Expressed another way: the most important thing on your tombstone is the dash, it’s what you did while you were here. In short, the poem asks us: did you make every moment and relationship count?

The Dash by Linda Ellis

I read of a man who stood to speak
At the funeral of a friend
He referred to the dates on the tombstone
From the beginning…to the end

He noted that first came the date of birth
And spoke the following date with tears,
But he said what mattered most of all
Was the dash between those years

For that dash represents all the time
That they spent alive on earth.
And now only those who loved them
Know what that little line is worth

For it matters not, how much we own,
The cars…the house…the cash.
What matters is how we live and love
And how we spend our dash.

So, think about this long and hard.
Are there things you’d like to change?
For you never know how much time is left
That can still be rearranged.

If we could just slow down enough
To consider what’s true and real
And always try to understand
The way other people feel.

And be less quick to anger
And show appreciation more
And love the people in our lives
Like we’ve never loved before.

If we treat each other with respect
And more often wear a smile,
Remembering this special dash
Might only last a little while

So, when your eulogy is being read
With your life’s actions to rehash…
Would you be proud of the things they say
About how you spent YOUR dash?

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For further reading: hellopoetry.com/poem/1184764/the-dash-poem-by-linda-ellis/
lifeism.co/the-dash-poem-by-linda-ellis

After the Suffering, You Get to Keep the Lessons and the Pain Goes Away

04/27/202205/01/2022 / Alexander Atkins

“I do have a love-hate relationship with this place [rainforest of Vancouver Island]. You get up in the morning and you confront the realities of your situation. Some days it’s great, some days it’s horrible. But suffering has value. We avoid it at all costs. We would never want to go back and repeat it, but it has value. It’s a part of life and nobody gets through life without suffering, nobody. [The] question is — what do you allow it to do in you? You can allow that suffering to make you bitter, angry, just a wretched person — you know? [Or] you can allow that suffering to eat away at your soul, turn it on itself, and just chew you apart. Or you can look for the deeper meaning it. My philosophy on suffering is that God is trying to teach me something and I know that in the end, I get to keep those lessons and the pain goes away.”

Post-apocalyptic fiction writer David McIntyre (50) reflecting on his experience surviving in the harsh, formidable remote wilderness of Vancouver Island, Canada — deep in black bear, cougar, and wolf territory — for 66 days without any food, water, shelter and without any contact with the outside world. McIntyre won the second season of Alone (History Channel, 2016) by outlasting nine other isolated survivalists who also tested their survival skills by living entirely off the land. The winner gets $500,000 and bragging rights.

The show Alone is billed as “the ultimate test of human will;” however, that is only part of the overall picture: it is also the ultimate test of courage, strength, sustainability, and adaptability. While half of the participants dropped off before day 30 due to a variety of factors, including fear, debilitating hunger, injury, hypothermia, overwhelming longing for companionship and home, and close encounters with deadly predators; the other half endured the torment of profound isolation — a brutal, unrelenting mixture of mental torment and loneliness. With each passing day, each participant moved closer to their own psychological breaking point. Only McIntyre persevered, escaping mental anguish, battling starvation and intense loneliness, by having a positive mental attitude, a healthy self-identity, and focusing on the present: “[I] stressed the importance of now. What you do with your now is the only time you get to do anything. What can you do right now to make tomorrow easier.”

The experience emphasizes that survival skills (ingenuity and resourcefulness), good health, and physical strength and endurance are not enough to survive alone in the wilderness. The greatest challenge for all participants, especially those that break the 30-day barrier, is the powerful effects of extended isolation, which is manifested in tortuous thinking and loneliness. Participants describe tortuous thinking as being tormented by your personal demons — revisiting over and over again every mistake and regret in your life; “every skeleton in your closet comes out and you can’t get away from them” — to paraphrase an old adage “The devil finds work for idle minds.” The loneliness is experienced as profound longing for companionship, for personal connection. Research has shown that protacted isolation and loneliness can negatively impact a person physical, mental, and cognitive health. Adverse health consequences include impaired cognitive function and decision-making, depression, increased anxiety, disrupted sleep, poor cardiovascular function, lower body strength, impaired immunity — and ultimately, increasing the risk of early death.

After their wilderness experience, all participants gain a new-found appreciation of their loved ones. McIntyre adds, “How many dads would run into a burning building for their children, but they don’t put down the [TV] remote. Use this time to take inventory on and invest in the people and relationships that truly matter to you and back away from the ones that are toxic. Learn the lessons that [being alone in the wilderness] has forced upon us.”

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For further reading: http://www.apa.org/monitor/2019/05/ce-corner-isolation
http://www.history.com/shows/alone
http://www.wzzm13.com/article/news/health/coronavirus/david-mcintyre-alone-covid-survival-skills-tips/69-9ded7ccd-caf0-407a-b19c-d1fe1d131949

Little Books, Big Ideas: Life Stinks

01/26/202201/26/2022 / Alexander Atkins / Leave a comment

In my periodic visits to used bookstores, I recently came across such a little book: Life Stinks: A Wry Look at Hopelessness, Despair, & Disaster by Armand Eisen published by Andrews and McMeel in 1995. In the introduction, Eisen writes: “It’s sad but true that fate stays in the background most of our lives, showing up only to hand us the fuzzy end of a lollipop. The overwhelming weight of evidence proves that life stinks: If there’s a fifty-fifty chance of toast falling on the floor buttered side down, why does it do so 99% of the time? There’s no rhyme, no reason, and absolutely no justice. It seems there’s only on certainty in life — it’s unfair… Only blind optimism could doubt the facts… The truth is that we’re all bound by Murphy’s Law, which states that anything can go wrong, especially when you least expect it.”

Below are some wry and pithy quotations (Ever look up the word “pithy” in a dictionary? It’s one of those useless definitions where the editors, for whatever reason, were just too lazy to finish the definition: “containing much pith.” You don’t say?), collected by the book’s author, to build the case that life stinks. You be the judge — does life really stink?

Optimism is a mania for saying things are well when one is in hell. (Voltaire)

Hell is other people. (Jean-Paul Sartre, No Exit)

Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows. (William Shakespeare, The Tempest)

The basic fact about human existence is not that it is a tragedy, but that it is a bore. (H. L. Mencken)

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane. (Marchus Aurelius)

Meditate upon exile, torture, wars, diseases, shipwreck so that you may not be a novice to any misfortune. (Seneca)

In the depths of my heart I can’t help being convinced that my dear fellow men, with a few exceptions, are worthless. (Sigmund Freud, Private Letter to Lou Andreas-Salome, 1929)

It is not true that life is one damn thing after another — it’s one damn thing over and over. (Edna St. Vincent Millay)

Success is merely one achievement that covers up a multitude of blunders. (George Bernard Shaw)

A bank is a place where they lend you an umbrella in fair weather and ask for it back when it begins to rain. (Robert Frost, [attributed])

Nothing is so good as it seems beforehand. (George Eliot)

I have the true feeling of myself only when I am unbearably unhappy. (Franz Kafka, The Diaries of Franz Kafka: 1914-1923)

The secret of being miserable is to have the leisure to bother about whether you are happy or not. (George Bernard Shaw)

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The Wisdom of a Bookseller and Former Garbage Man

12/15/202112/15/2021 / Alexander Atkins / 1 Comment

As a lifelong book collector, one of the greatest rewards of collecting books is the fantastic people you meet along the way. A subgroup of those people is the bookseller. Sadly, the bookseller is part of a dying breed of passionate and enlightened custodians of that often-overlooked commodity — the glorious printed book that passes wisdom and wondrous stories from one generation to the next. If you have traveled around the globe, you know that you will find these bookstores and their dedicated bibliophilic stewards in some of the most unlikely places, toiling away, silently, amid the stacks and bookshelves that inhabit their quaint shops, filled with that enchanting aroma of old books.

Bibliophiles will feel instant kinship with such a bookseller: John Scott, the owner and proprietor of New Morning Books, a small bookshop with an incredible inventory located in Adelaide, Australia. Thanks to filmmaker David Thorpe’s short documentary, titled “Turned Pages,” you don’t have to travel around the world to meet him. As soon as the interview begins, Scott captures your interest with his profound love of books and fascinating perspectives on book collecting and the book business.

One of the first questions that I ask booksellers is, “How did you get started in the bookselling business?” Thorpe must have asked that question off-camera because Scott addresses it early in the documentary. His answer will surprise many bibliophiles and booksellers because, at least initially, it so unorthodox (and perhaps paradoxical): “The real seed [to becoming a bookseller], I think, was sown when I was working as a garbage man in the north of England, when I was knocking around England in the 60s, and we would often get books that we would pick up. It was a very posh area [that] produced a lot of antiques and collectibles. I was living in a household full of university students and [in] every university there was a very good secondhand bookshop. I thought that this looked like a pretty nice way to spend one’s life and a nice way to meet one’s living. So it was there as a vague ambition in the back of my mind from my teens. I started working in the very early 70s for university coop bookshop in Sydney and before very long I was managing one of their shops and I had not been long in the bookselling environment when I realize this was for me — this is what I wanted to do for the rest of my life and indeed I have.”

One of the most memorable moments in the documentary occurs near the end, when Scott generously offers this timeless, sage advice: “If anybody happens to see this, [anybody] who is young and who has a consuming interest in life — my advice to them would be: identify what it is in life you love the most and then try to commercialize it, so you can spend your life doing just that…. I’ve had nearly 30 years doing [what I love]; [but] I wish I’d had 50. I wish I’d done it when I was in my late teens or early twenties. But, you know, [the old proverb] “if wishes were horses, beggars would ride.” And I have no right to complain; [I’ve] had a wonderful career and I’ve met the most fantastic people. You know that’s one of big emotional payoffs — sort of — [in a] business like this — the people that you meet. But I have [known] people that have been corporate lawyers who are multimillionaires who are hooked on the money and hooked on the lifestyle but who, at the end of their lives, wish they devoted themselves to something that was more soul nurturing. It’s well said that nobody on their deathbed ever wishes they worked harder. Very few people on their deathbed wish they made more money — what they want is the idea that they live a life that has some spiritual content and value to it. And I can say that this [career as a bookseller] has had plenty.” Amen to that, brother — if an individual wants a fulfilling life, he or she should choose meaning over money.

Not only is Scott’s advice so valuable to people, particularly those graduating from high school or college, he also introduces us to that wonderful Scottish proverb that you do not hear that often: “If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.” The proverb means that if wishing something would make it happen, then even the poorest individuals would have everything they wanted. Another defintion is that simply wishing for something does not yield anything or expressed another way: rather than wishing for things, one should work to get them. This proverb comes from a collection of proverbs, Proverbs in Scot by James Carmichael, published in 1628 which, in turn, is based on a rhyme included in Remaines of a Greater Worke, Concerning Britaine by William Camden, published in 1605. The original line was quite different than the one recorded by Carmichael: “If wishes were thrushes, beggars would eat birds.”

Watch the documentary on YouTube by searching “Turned Pages Second-hand Bookstore Documentary”

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Little Books, Big Ideas: Greek Proverbs

10/08/202110/08/2021 / Alexander Atkins / Leave a comment

In my periodic visits to used bookstores, I recently came across such a thought-provoking little book: Greek Proverbs by Vailiki Stathes published by Aeolos in Athens, Greece in 1998. In the introduction, Stathes, a language teacher, writes: “Proverbs are man’s insight into human nature. Handed down from generation to generation, they irony and wisdom are still on point in countless present-day situations. They strike so true that they are incorporated into our common speech. We allude to them without ever realizing our indebtedness to parents and grandparents.” Over the years, Stathes has collected over 500 proverbs. For this book, he selected the most popular ones, as well as those that originated in Greece: “popularity and familiarity were the main criteria for their inclusion.” Here are some notable Greek proverbs:

Those who are not dancing, sing many songs.

From the child and from the fool, one learns the truth.

A clear sky is not afraid of lightning

Little by little, one goes far.

Listen to all and believe what you want.

A small hole can sink a big ship.

You can knock all you want at a deaf man’s door.

One is the product of his teacher.

From the thorn comes a rose, and from the rose comes a thorn.

Where you are I’ve been, and where I am you’ll be.

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What Will Be Your Last Words Before the Final Curtain Falls?

06/07/202106/10/2021 / Alexander Atkins

alex atkins bookshelf wisdom Why are we so fascinated by a person’s last words? Perhaps we believe that these final words somehow recount in just a few words the meaning of his or her entire life. Shakespeare’s John of Gaunt, from Richard II, observes that these few final words are profoundly meaningful: “O! but they say the tongues of dying men / Enforce attention like deep harmony: / When words are scarce, they are seldom spent in vain, / For they breathe truth that breathe their words in pain.” Yet another reason is that a person’s last words reveal something about his or her character, particularly in the shadow of death. And finally, last words can sometimes provide some insight of what it is like to die.

There is this wonderfully poignant and thought-provoking scene in The Kominsky Method in season five, episode three, titled “Near, far, wherever you are.” Having just lost his closest friend and agent of many years, and now losing his ex-wife to leukemia, the protagonist, Sandy Kominsky, a famous acting coach in Hollywood in his twilight years, addresses his students about playing death scenes. With a mixture of deep sorrow and compassion, Kominsky reflects on those precious, fleeting moments, focusing on a person’s last thoughts and words before the final curtain falls:

“Let’s talk about the subject matter of the scene — dying, on camera or on stage, to play a heartbreaking and hopefully slow death, is the dream of every actor. I would wage there’s not an actor or actress who hasn’t fantasized about how they would play those final moments… as the life force slowly slips away and as we teeter on the edge of nonexistence — how would we gasp out those last words of wit and wisdom? But is that what happens as death draws close? Do the dying exact promises from those they leave behind? Do they confess their sins? Do they make a joke?… What I’m asking you to think about is what actually happens in those final moments. I’m not talking about a shocking, violent death. I’m talking about… when you know it’s coming. When you’ve fully surrendered to the ultimate magic trick — when we really and truly disappear. I’ve sat at the bedside and I’ve held the hands of friends and loved ones as they breathed their last breath… and I can tell you this: the dramatic soliloquy at the end of life is pure and utter nonsense. If anything is being said, it’s internal. You can almost hear it. They’re having an internal conversation filled with disbelief and wonder that their life has come to an end. They hardly notice you sitting there at all. For the dying, the living are irrelevant. So, if you should ever have the opportunity to play such a scene — approach it with reverence. Consider it holy. Make sure it receives your utmost care and respect.”

When circumstances permit and that final curtain begins to fall, what will you be thinking about? Who do you want to be near you? What will be your final words? What dreams may come in that sleep of death? (Recall those memorable lines from Hamlet’s famous soliloquy: “To die, to sleep — / To sleep — perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub, / For in that sleep of death what dreams may come / When we have shuffled off this mortal coil…”)

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Best Commencement Speeches: David Foster Wallace

06/04/202106/05/2021 / Alexander Atkins

alex atkins bookshelf wisdom David Foster Wallace was an American novelist, best known for Infinite Jest and The Pale King, and a professor of English at Emerson College, Illinois State University, and Pomona College. Some literary critics consider Wallace one of the most innovative and influential writers in the last two decades. Sadly, after struggling with depression for many years, Wallace committed suicide in 2008, at the age of 46. His readers and the literary and academic communities experienced a great sense of loss; Wallace was acknowledged by many glowing tributes and four public memorial services.

In 2005, an English and Philosophy student from the commencement speaker committee from Kenyon College, a small prestigious liberal arts college located in Gambier, Ohio (with an enchanting Hogwarts School vibe), invited Wallace to deliver the commencement address to the school’s graduating class. He was told he could speak on any topic. His speech, delivered on May 21, 2005, is titled “This is Water” because Wallace uses water as a metaphor for the essential things in life that are hidden in plain sight, so easy to overlook. This mirrors one of the most famous lines in St. Exupery’s The Little Prince — “What is essential is invisible to the eye” (in the original French: “L’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux.”), spoken by the fox.

Wallace uses the opportunity of a college commencement speech to share the most important lessons he has learned in life. He addresses several important questions, including “How do we keep from going through adult life unconsciously, comfortably entrenched in habit (“the default setting”)? How do we remove ourselves from the foreground of our thoughts and achieve compassion? How do we think about our world and separate the truth from the lies? Ultimately, Wallace believes that the goal of education is to create individuals who think freely and critically and act compassionately. It is no wonder that “This is Water” is considered to be one of the best commencement speeches of all time.

Wallace’s speech was published four years later in a small book titled This is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a Significant Occasion, about Living a Compassionate Life. Inexplicably, however, Wallace’s speech was broken up into isolated paragraphs and sentences, each centered on their own page. Reading his eloquent and passionate speech this way is incredibly disjointed — not to mention, annoying. It’s like reading a long essay by piecing together dozens of tiny bits of paper from fortune cookies. It’s a good thing the editors of this small tome did not work on Infinite Jest — otherwise that lengthy novel, running 1,079 pages containing 577,608 words, would have been published in 60 volumes. Although Wallace committed suicide by hanging, the editors deleted the last two sentences of the original speech that refer to suicide by gunshot: “It is not the least bit coincidental that adults who commit suicide with firearms almost always shoot themselves in the head. They shoot the terrible master.”

Here are some key excerpts from “This is Water”:

“There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says “Morning, boys. How’s the water?” And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes “What the hell is water?”… The point of the fish story is merely that the most obvious, important realities are often the ones that are hardest to see and talk about. Stated as an English sentence, of course, this is just a banal platitude, but the fact is that in the day to day trenches of adult existence, banal platitudes can have a life or death importance.

The point here is that I think this is one part of what teaching me how to think is really supposed to mean. To be just a little less arrogant. To have just a little critical awareness about myself and my certainties. Because a huge percentage of the stuff that I tend to be automatically certain of is, it turns out, totally wrong and deluded. I have learned this the hard way, as I predict you graduates will, too.

Here is just one example of the total wrongness of something I tend to be automatically sure of: everything in my own immediate experience supports my deep belief that I am the absolute centre of the universe; the realest, most vivid and important person in existence. We rarely think about this sort of natural, basic self-centredness because it’s so socially repulsive. But it’s pretty much the same for all of us. It is our default setting, hard-wired into our boards at birth. Think about it: there is no experience you have had that you are not the absolute centre of. The world as you experience it is there in front of YOU or behind YOU, to the left or right of YOU, on YOUR TV or YOUR monitor. And so on. Other people’s thoughts and feelings have to be communicated to you somehow, but your own are so immediate, urgent, real.

Given the triumphant academic setting here, an obvious question is how much of this work of adjusting our default setting involves actual knowledge or intellect. This question gets very tricky. Probably the most dangerous thing about an academic education–least in my own case–is that it enables my tendency to over-intellectualise stuff, to get lost in abstract argument inside my head, instead of simply paying attention to what is going on right in front of me, paying attention to what is going on inside me.

As I’m sure you guys know by now, it is extremely difficult to stay alert and attentive, instead of getting hypnotised by the constant monologue inside your own head (may be happening right now). Twenty years after my own graduation, I have come gradually to understand that the liberal arts cliché about teaching you how to think is actually shorthand for a much deeper, more serious idea: learning how to think really means learning how to exercise some control over how and what you think. It means being conscious and aware enough to choose what you pay attention to and to choose how you construct meaning from experience. Because if you cannot exercise this kind of choice in adult life, you will be totally hosed. Think of the old cliché about “the mind being an excellent servant but a terrible master.”

This, I submit, is the freedom of a real education, of learning how to be well-adjusted. You get to consciously decide what has meaning and what doesn’t. You get to decide what to worship.

Because here’s something else that’s weird but true: in the day-to-day trenches of adult life, there is actually no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship. And the compelling reason for maybe choosing some sort of god or spiritual-type thing to worship–be it JC or Allah, be it YHWH or the Wiccan Mother Goddess, or the Four Noble Truths, or some inviolable set of ethical principles–is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive. If you worship money and things, if they are where you tap real meaning in life, then you will never have enough, never feel you have enough. It’s the truth. Worship your body and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly. And when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally grieve you. On one level, we all know this stuff already. It’s been codified as myths, proverbs, clichés, epigrams, parables; the skeleton of every great story. The whole trick is keeping the truth up front in daily consciousness.

Worship power, you will end up feeling weak and afraid, and you will need ever more power over others to numb you to your own fear. Worship your intellect, being seen as smart, you will end up feeling stupid, a fraud, always on the verge of being found out. But the insidious thing about these forms of worship is not that they’re evil or sinful, it’s that they’re unconscious. They are default settings.

They’re the kind of worship you just gradually slip into, day after day, getting more and more selective about what you see and how you measure value without ever being fully aware that that’s what you’re doing.

And the so-called real world will not discourage you from operating on your default settings, because the so-called real world of men and money and power hums merrily along in a pool of fear and anger and frustration and craving and worship of self. Our own present culture has harnessed these forces in ways that have yielded extraordinary wealth and comfort and personal freedom. The freedom all to be lords of our tiny skull-sized kingdoms, alone at the centre of all creation. This kind of freedom has much to recommend it. But of course there are all different kinds of freedom, and the kind that is most precious you will not hear much talk about much in the great outside world of wanting and achieving…. The really important kind of freedom involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day.

That is real freedom. That is being educated, and understanding how to think. The alternative is unconsciousness, the default setting, the rat race, the constant gnawing sense of having had, and lost, some infinite thing.

The capital-T Truth is about life BEFORE death.

It is about the real value of a real education, which has almost nothing to do with knowledge, and everything to do with simple awareness; awareness of what is so real and essential, so hidden in plain sight all around us, all the time, that we have to keep reminding ourselves over and over: “This is water… This is water.”

It is unimaginably hard to do this, to stay conscious and alive in the adult world day in and day out. Which means yet another grand cliché turns out to be true: your education really IS the job of a lifetime. And it commences: now.

I wish you way more than luck.”

The full text of the speech can be read here.

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For further reading:
The Legacy of David Foster Wallace by Samuel Cohen and Lee Konstantinou
Gesturing Toward Reality: David Foster Wallace and Philosophy by Robert Bolger and Scott Korb
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/03/09/the-unfinished

What is the Most Important Meditation We Can Do Now?

05/25/2021 / Alexander Atkins

Evolution biologist and futurist Elisabet Sahtouris shared a wonderful story about the time she met the Dalai Lama. Someone in the group asked the Dalai Lama what is the most important meditation we can do now? Without any hesitation he answered: “Critical thinking followed by action. Discern what your world is — know the plot, the scenario of this human drama, and then figure out where your talents might fit in to make a better world. And each of us must do something that will make our heart sing, because nobody will want to do it with us if we are not passionate and inspired.”

From the documentary “I Am” directed by Tom Shadyac. The documentary answers two important questions: (1) What’s wrong with the world? and (2) What can we do about it? The documentary features fascinating interviews with Desmond Tutu, Howard Zinn, Noam Chomsky, Lynne McTaggart, Coleman Barks, David Suzuki, Elisabet Sahtouris, and Thom Hartmann who share their brilliant insights. The title of the documentary comes from a letter written by the British author and theologian, G. K. Chesterton. In 1908 The Times of London asked notable authors to write an essay on the topic: “What’s wrong with the world?” Chesterton’s was the shortest essay received: “Dear Sirs, I am. Sincerely yours, G. K. Chesterton.”

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